The Fringe experience wasn't new for me. My debut as a moorhen in a student musical went down a storm. Later, moving on to bigger and better things, I performed with Frisky & Mannish as a "small child" on the cabaret circuit. And I'd also been a lot of times just to get sloshed in the Pleasance Dome.

The central character in Punch is the most heinous, twisted, barbarous person I have ever tried writing. He's impervious to any shred of empathy, tact or compassion and yet I agree with (almost) everything he says.

So, here we are again, to answer the most important question in modern Britain: IS THE VOICE BETTER THAN BRITAIN'S GOT TALENT? All is to play for as we continue to examine THE BATTLE OF THE JUDGES, this time focusing on the homoerotic inter-judge flirting.

The judges, three of whom are on the panel for the first time, have each contributed the most memorably ludicrous moments of the series. Returning granddad Louis Walsh had surpassed the realm of self-parody by week four.